Famous personalities

The Composer Gustav Mahler in Dobbiaco
From 1908 to 1910 the famous Composer Gustav Mahler enjoyed his summer holidays at the Trenkerhof farm in Carbonin Vecchia. It was here that he created his Ninth Symphony, the unfinished Tenth Symphony and “Das Lied von der Erde.”
The composing house is still intact.
The Gustav Mahler Music Weeks take place every year in honour of the composer.

Composer and Conductor Sebastian Baur
Sebastian Baur was born on 20 April 1878. He spent all his life working in Dobbiaco. He was educated in the boys’ choir school in Abbazia di Novacella near Bressanone and in a teacher training school in Bolzano. Baur was a particularly gifted player of the piano and the organ. As he was also frequently a conductor he was also well acquainted with the techniques needed to play wind instruments.
Sebastian Baur was working mainly as an organist and choirmaster in Dobbiaco and in Sesto and was highly respected among his peers. His cosmopolitan works include 10 masses, several requiems, several Tantum-Ergo, several offertories and procession hymns. His pieces for wind orchestras were written exclusively for the orchestra in Dobbiaco. He died on 12 September 1947 in the town of his birth.

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Emperor Maximilian I and Herbst Castle in Dobbiaco
Immediately behind the cemetery of the parish church of Dobbiaco arise the massive, fortress-like walls of Herbst Castle. The castle was acquired in 1500 by the brothers Kaspar and Christoph zu Herbstenburg as seat of the court and converted to a fortified complex. Today the building is the private property of an aristocratic family.
From 1508 to 1511 during the war against Venice, Emperor Maximilian I of Habsburg used Herbst Castle as residence for his Imperial court. Emperor Maximilian I was the son of Emperor Frederick III and was born in 1495 in Wiener Neustadt. In 1477 he married Mary of Burgundy. In 1508 Maximilian, with the assent of the Pope but without a coronation in Rome, assumed the title of Emperor. From then on he called himself “Elected Roman Emperor”.

Til Schweiger
In the spring of 2014 actor and film-maker Til Schweiger wrote on his Facebook page: "we looove dobbiaco...!" and “südtirol [and South Tyrol]....!!!!:-):-):-) my big love.....!" As a child Til Schweiger spent his summer holidays with his aunt in Dobbiaco.
In 1925 the Glauber Family, into which Til’s aunt had married, founded the company UNDA in Dobbiaco, which produced top quality radios. These radios were very advanced for their time and sold in large quantities, until the beginning of the Second World War, when many of the skilled workers emigrated and Mussolini relocated the company to Como. For many years after the Second World War the company continued to produce radios and televisions sets. Maybe Til Schweiger’s love for film and television is connected with this!